


Wolf Hunt

by eyrror



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Mental Health Issues, Suicide, Trespasser, Trespasser DLC
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-09
Updated: 2017-04-09
Packaged: 2018-10-16 20:05:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10578552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eyrror/pseuds/eyrror
Summary: Nesiaris Lavellan has struggled with depression since taking the role of Inquisitor, but it only seems to get worse with every new piece of information she encounters about her once-lover. Two years of betrayal and anger is finally let loose when she finally meets Solas face-to-face for the first time since he left the Inquisition.





	

Depression had become more apparent for Nesiaris as the responsibilities of the Inquisition increased. It seemed that each day, more lives relied on her for sustenance, protection, and guidance. She began to feel perilously guilty when the Inquisition did not have the funds to help with missing villagers, lost items, or donations of supplies. These feelings only increased tenfold after Solas declared that he was but humoring her for the duration of their relationship, or so she felt he told her. After they battled and won against Corypheus, he vanished when he found the telltale orb broken in the remnants of the battlefield. Nesiaris did not think he could scorn her further than when he told her he had selfishly indulged in their relationship just after removing her black Mythal vallaslin, but his disappearance wounded her even deeper.

 

As the months trudged on, her depression wrapped and wound itself around every corner of her mind, inspiring self-doubt and self-loathing in the recourse of every decision she made. Upon reaching the Exalted Council, she was relieved at the proposition of dissolving the Inquisition and disappearing into the shadows without leaving a trace. She simply wished to be left to her own devices to deal with the baggage being the Inquisitor had so graciously bestowed upon her, but the discovery of the dead Qunari in the Winter Palace told her that, once more, the world would need the Inquisition. Perhaps they would not yet be disbanded, she thought, as she traversed the Crossroads, uncovering the Qunari’s plot to activate Saarebas. Images of the Dread Wolf and his supposedly valiant efforts to save the elves flashed before her even as she sleep at night. Fen’Harel was nothing but a traitor, she tried tirelessly to tell herself, despite what Solas had once told her about the Creators. But the images of the Dread Wolf as a savior still persisted and haunted her, lying awake or crying herself into the near-dreamless sleep she had become accustomed to since the Inquisition slowly took over every facet of her being.

 

Now, she had finally reached the end of the road. Iron Bull, Cole, and Dorian were leaning against pillars and sitting on the ground drinking from their water skins after an intense battle with Saareth that left the party more or less seriously wounded. Dorian administered potions and attempted to heal Bull and Cole, but Nesiaris shoved him off hastily while letting down her shoulder-length blonde hair when he attempted to help her. She was too determined to find Solas. She had resolved that her fate in destroying Dragon’s Breath would cause her death, and she felt surprisingly relieved at the notion of dying. Upon realizing Solas was to blame for this last, death-worthy mission, Nesiaris knew she had to find him and cripple his world like she did his. To pay him back for all the poisoned advice and sweet nothings, the few sorrow-filled words that led to their split, and the wave of infernal magic that removed the last semblance of identity she had left. She was a fool. He made her a fool, and she couldn’t allow him to leave knowing she stood idly by after he broke her heart. She would not look as helpless as she felt.

Nesiaris all but cautiously toed up to the location she heard her once-lover’s voice drift from. The Viddasala, reprimanded and dejected by his dismissal, prepared to hurl a spear as faced his back to her, but was met with the same anticlimactic fate of her brethren. Despite observing this effect all throughout the Crossroads where her former lover had led her in a wild goose chase through, she reached for her quiver. As soon as he turned, she raised her bow, the nock even with the Dread Wolf’s nose. “I suspect you have questions,” he asked with a soft, jarring smile. This aggravated Nesiaris further, and two years’ worth of bitterness began to brim at her lips and through her eyes, tensing her knuckles and locking her knees in place. Nesiaris’s eyes were cold and even, and her voice dripped a poison unlike any Solas had ever heard through their split, “I don’t.” She knew he didn’t have the gall to grant her the same fate as the Qunari behind her, and thus she held her offensive position.

His lips parted in a fashion that could only suggest that he expected her to at least query him. He closed his mouth, inhaled, and attempted again to speak with hands raised in ceasefire, “Vhenan, please,” he all but begged for her patience, to just explain his actions to her. He sought her understanding, but did not expect her forgiveness, if for no reason other than to absolve the guilt he held when he feared to tell her his truth before. Yet Solas saw the rage in her eyes and how rigid she held herself now. She looked paler and smaller than he recalled. He pitied her, and it must have shown on his face as her hands had begun to shake.

Nesiaris’s fingers were trembling on her bow, turning white from the pressure of drawing the bow for such a significant period of time without firing. She hissed out her next words: “You betrayed us. You left us. I came ready to _finally_ die, saving the world once again, because of what you caused!” She almost added that she had come to the realization this was not the first time his actions had very nearly led to her death, but bit her tongue for a reason she could never admit aloud. But the hope she held onto did not keep her from the biting words that came next, “Ar bellana Din’An Heem!”

“It was not I who urged the Qunari to begin the preparations of Saarebas, nor was I the one who wielded the orb when it tore open the Veil,” he countered, measuring his responses as cautiously as he always had, though he seemed to falter somewhat. In doubt and shame, she pondered. “I could not have known Corypheus had discovered the secret to effective immortality; I had merely expected his death upon attempting to unlock it.”

“No, but it was _your_ orb,” Nesiaris spat. “That fact was pounded into my head, along with stories of your so-called heroism and every other bit of propaganda in this self-aggrandizing little paradise of yours.” This insult seemed to strike Solas, whose eyes had hardened almost imperceptibly. Nesiaris knew him all too well, though. What buttons to push, how to twist the knife, where his passions and thus his weaknesses lay. “As always, you’re so expectant and condescending. I shouldn’t even be surprised you built a place like this to honor your ever so heartfelt attempts to save the elves from themselves.”

Keeping his tone even, he responded in kind, “It’s true, the valley was constructed to bring me more glory than was deserved. The truth of that time was far more bloody than I would care to admit.”

“You can’t speak to what caring would even begin to entail, _harellan_ . Did we really mean so little to you? We couldn’t even compare to your divinity and power, even as you were recovering from tearing a divide between our world and the Fade. We were _nothing_.” Years of anger came pouring from Nesiaris’s words, expressing everything she had kept from her closest friends in the Inquisition as a result of intense shame, self-loathing, and isolation.

“ _Our_ world was one with the Fade, Lethallin. It still would be were Mythal not murdered by the Evanuris.” His emphasis on her clan’s name scalded her, reminding her of the marks he’d stolen from her. The culture she’d lost. No matter how wrong or deluded he thought they were, it still remained important to Nesiaris. She suspected their legends were wrong to some extent, but it never bothered her until the Dread Wolf himself explained what he supposedly saw in the Fade to her like a weak, simpering, struggling child. He made her feel small when he explained such things, and she couldn’t bear to sit through another one of his lectures, pandering support for his self-pitying worldview that was simultaneously stunningly arrogant. The losses she endured, all this time. Her memories, her culture, her love. Everything, he’d taken.

Her hands were flushed bright red and white with nerves firing and satisfyingly cutting pain in her fingers. In her rage, she let the arrow hurl itself into the trunk of a nearby tree with a woody _thwump_. “But it’s not anymore, is it!” She hadn’t noticed that she’d begun yelling, but continued to combat her former lover in a louder tone. “People have led rich, fulfilling lives without the Fade being joined to the physical world, Solas. You can’t take that away from them, and all the lives that would follow them. Ma banal las halamshir var vhen! Restoring what once was is not going to absolve your guilt or make you any less of an arrogant, self-pitying prick! You’re no better than Corypheus. I’d wager you enjoyed tugging at my strings and commanding your network of spies through my organization as we attempted to put the world you tore apart back together again.”

“Can we stop pretending your concern is with the fate of the humans, Qunari, or dwarves for just a moment? Let us end this masquerade where you care for the world that butchered your entire clan in Wycome, enslaved your people, destroyed Arlathan, and intended to enslave not only the bodies of your people but also their minds? Do you truly believe Thedas was improved by the creation of the Veil?”

“They’re our people, Solas! We’re the same! If you don’t think we’re equals, look me in the eyes and admit it,” as she ended the sentence, her voice broke. Tears were beginning to brim at her eyes, a brine that begged and beseeched her once-lover to just give her the scathing insult that would allow her to finally let go of all hope. To prove to her that he never cared, never would, and that she was but a pawn in his elaborate self-gratifying chess game.

“The People have lost so much--”

“Tell me we’re not equals.”

“Vhenan, it’s not--”

“Do not call me that. Don’t ever...Tel’lath ma!” Nesiaris’s sentences began being punctuated by sobs, and a sharp clawing in her chest begged to be set free, but no amount of tears would release its hold on her.

 

The anchor began to flare up once more, threatening its largest detonation yet. Nesiaris fell to her knees, bending her body so her forehead nearly leveled with the ground and her elbows dug sharply into her thighs. Nesiaris could only hope this time it would kill her, but the gentle hand that grasped her wrist immediately soothed the mark’s magic, taking even death from her. When Nesiaris looked back up, she saw Solas on the ground with her, on the same level, his eyes fading from a blinding crystal blue to his typical stormy countenance and grey-blue eyes. Not even kneeling, Solas was on his knees in front of her. It seemed apologetic and symbolic to be on the same level, on the ground nonetheless, as if he were trying to tell her that they truly were not so different.

“We don’t have much time, vhenan,” Solas said, his eyes filled with concern and remorse.

 

This time, there was no pity. She saw regret when she looked at him, but the statement that came from his mouth nearly brought a laugh bubbling up from her chest and she had to look away from him. “Creators, please, I would rather die than continue living in the immense pain you’ve put me through already! Fenedhis, Solas...”

“I did love you, vhenan. And I still do. Please believe that. I did not want you to have to bear this burden alongside me,” he bent himself lower, trying to look her in the eye from her downward cast face. He dared raise a hand to tuck a lock of glimmering blonde hair behind her ear and gently trail his fingers along her freckled cheekbones to her delicate jaw. She nearly flinched, but instead grabbed his wrist with the palm that bore the anchor, looking up at him with warning in her amber eyes.

“You’d already bestowed me with the anchor and doomed me to death, what more could you take from me by just explaining who you were from the start?” Nesiaris begged, searching for a better excuse than what he had just given her, not realizing the grip she still held on his hand and how his fingers had slackened in deference.

“Ir abelas, vhenan. It was not supposed to be like this. I meant for this entire process to be painless. Least of all, I did not intend to cause you any more pain than you were already going through as a result of my miscalculations. My aim was not to seduce you into loving me to render you pliant for my plans. I hadn’t even considered what may happen when we first kissed in the Fade. Immediately after, I felt selfish. If you found out who I was and what I had done, you would feel used.”

“Solas, ‘used’ doesn’t begin to describe it,” Nesiaris huffed, releasing her grip on Solas’ wrist. His hand fell to her knee, a plea for understanding laced with intimacy. She was bothered by his use of hypotheticals, since the past he described had come true in a bitterly accurate fashion.

“I suppose not. But it doesn’t change how I felt about you, and the way that I continue to feel,” his fingers curled under his palm into a fist on her knee and his eyes fell down to the dust beneath their forms. “I regret that I hurt you.”

“I regret that I let you,” Nesiaris turned her face away, looking back at the stone-preserved Qunari. “You’re right, you know,” she breathed. Solas waited patiently for her to continue, looking at her face and using his thumb to gently drag the along the side of her knee to let her know he was listening. “The elves suffered for what you did, and the life we had that followed when you created the Veil was inevitable. Such was war, though. If you hadn’t locked away the Evanuris in the Fade, we could have enslaved the humans. The Evanuris would have enslaved the humans. We didn’t deserve that power. Not then, and likely not now, either, with how embittered the elves have become towards the humans.” Nesiaris sighed, pulling back her hair anxiously. “I honestly have no idea what would solve this, and that terrifies me.” Solas had realized that his love had let her walls down again, albeit with much resistance. He was thankful for her calm, her willingness to consider alternatives in the face of adversity. He’d always deeply admired that trait. For a moment, he saw the woman he fell in love with shine through the shell she had become. He’d made her who she was, and tore her down all in the span of several months. Finally, the weight of his actions hit him like a veilstrike.

“Ma’salath...I am so sorry,” The immense pain in the Dread Wolf’s eyes swallowed all of the pain and anger that Nesiaris carried the past couple years. In this moment, he had also let his walls down in a desperate plea for forgiveness and understanding. He needed Nesiaris to know his love was not a lie, his hand drifted from her knee to touch the side of her face. This time, she neither flinched nor caught his wrist in defiance. She leaned into it, almost indiscernibly. “You are correct, Nesiaris,” he murmured. His gray eyes searched her amber ones for something she could not define. Empathy? Agreement? She could not say.

“I never stopped loving you. And I never forgot you. In another world, this would be an easier task. And perhaps the ending would be much happier,” he mourned, turning his eyes to the side momentarily. “Do you believe me, vhenan?”

This time, she knew what he wanted to hear. She remained silent for a moment, looking at his face and realizing he truly made himself completely vulnerable to her; that he sat lower than her and she even had to cast her glance slightly downward to meet his eyes. He resumed a submissive position, though it would not be apparent to any outsider observing their interaction. It appeared in the way he spoke and craned his neck, the way his fingers desperately touched her cheekbones and slowly made way to weave into her wavy blonde hair.

“I do,” she uttered, surprised at the relief that came awash over her entire being.

He leaned in slowly, testing the waters. When Nesiaris did not move, but actually closed her eyes, Solas closed the gap between their lips. If Nesiaris thought relief followed her previous statement, then the kiss had caused a flood. Tears of a different kind pricked at the corner of her eyes, and she felt one hit her lap before it even left her chin. She opened her eyes and pulled back to wipe them away, but found the Dread Wolf with reddened eyes and a light flush on his face. “You mean the world to me,” he breathed, using his hands in her hair to pull her close again, kissing her even more passionately. It was hungry, desperate, and pleading, unlike any kiss they ever shared before. In the past, it was always playful or passionate, but it was never so dark and needy the way he touched her. Nesiaris reached up to brace the back of his neck with one hand, and the other to firmly grasp onto his arm, clinging as though it were her last lifeline. A life she would actually prefer to hold onto now.

When they finally parted, he pulled her into his arms to hold her for a few moments more. “I don’t expect any of this to change your mind, Solas,” she began, her brows furrowed as she spoke softly against his quickly beating heart. “But give me a chance, please.”

“Only if you give me the same chance to earn your forgiveness, in time.”

“Maybe,” she chided, taking a small bit of pleasure in being withholding as she playfully did throughout the duration of their relationship.

“Ma serannas. I appreciate that you have listened to me. I will consider your words carefully when I consider what path is best taken to restore our people as equals. But now, our time has waned, and I must go. Ar lath ma, Nesiaris. Until we meet again, my love.” Solas lifted himself onto one knee, and pressed a loving kiss to her forehead before standing up completely and disappearing into the eluvian behind him.

Nesiaris waited there for some time, hoping he may return. Hope itself may have returned, if anything. For better or for worse. From that moment on, she searched for him in the glimpses of the Fade she caught and spent an inordinate amount of time studying Skyhold’s amassing collection of eluvians. She knew that the only way she could change his heart was with the very research he was always conducting, and committed herself to recovering texts and artifacts from before the Fall with the help of the Inquisition. Though the depression that plagued her still yet remained, her studies aptly provided the respite she so dearly needed. She expected Solas’ spies may still remain in the Inquisition in one way or another, but felt that this brought them closer. To Nesiaris, it meant he was able to keep a watchful eye over her. To keep her safe, as she felt he truly sought to do. In time, they may meet again.

**Author's Note:**

> Elven Translations  
> Ar bellana Din’An Heem - I will kill you  
> Ma banal las halamshir var vhen - You do nothing to help our people  
> Vhenan - My heart/term of endearment  
> Harellan - Betrayer  
> Tel’lath ma - You don’t love me  
> Fenedhis - A curse, likely equivalent to something like “Go suck a wolf’s dick”, as another author (Bdafic) has gracefully put  
> Ir abelas - I’m sorry  
> Ma’salath - My one [true] love  
> Ma serannas - Thank you
> 
> AN: Yes, I know that drawing a bow this long is impossible but I took some creative liberties here for the sake of some suspense. This was my first time writing creatively in probably four years, so hopefully it wasn't too bad. I hope you guys enjoyed it. :) I may write more if this gets decent ratings and feedback.


End file.
